1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a network facsimile apparatus capable of performing transmission and reception of facsimile data and e-mail data connecting to a PSTN and a network such as the Internet or LAN.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, it has been performed to connect a personal computer, work station, FAX server or the like to a network in order to transmit and receive an e-mail and facsimile and to browse homepages.
FIG. 1 illustrates a system structure of the case of performing facsimile transmission and reception using a FAX server. The reception operation at a client machine (personal computer) will be described next. FAX modem 1001 receives a call from the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) and fetches image data to transmit to FAX server 1002. FAX server software operating at FAX server 1002 receives the image data, and stores the image data as an image data file at file server 1003 through the network. At this point, the storage of facsimile received data is finished.
To fetch the received image data into client machine 1004, a user starts a dedicated application at client machine 1004 and reads out the image data from file server 1003 through the network.
Further, a method of reusing facsimile received data by combining an Internet FAX and a WWW server has been recently proposed. The method utilizes the function of the internet FAX which converts data received from the PSTN into an e-mail.
FIG. 2 illustrates a system structure of the case of performing facsimile transmission and reception using an internet FAX and a WWW server. The reception operation at the client machine will be described.
Image data received at internet FAX 1101 via the PSTN is converted into an attached file format to an e-mail at internet FAX 1101 and is transmitted to WWW server 1103 as an attached file of e-mail.
The e-mail with the attached file transferred from internet FAX 1101 is received at e-mail server 1102 via a network. The e-mail with the attached file received at e-mail server 1102 is transferred to WWW server 1103 that is a destination again via the network.
WWW server 1103 stores the attached file of e-mail as image data to link to a homepage for facsimile reception. The storage of facsimile received data is finished at this point.
In order to fetch received data into client machine 1104, a user starts a WWW browser at client machine 1104 and accesses to the homepage for facsimile reception at WWW server 1103. The user reads out an image data file at client machine 1104 via the network from WWW server 1103.
However, in the system using the above described FAX server, since image data is transferred two times through a network, i.e., from the FAX server to the file server and further from the file server to the client machine until the client machine receives facsimile received data, there is a problem that network traffic is increased.
Further, there is another problem that the system requires cost for a dedicated application which is needed to transmit and receive facsimile data at a file server for storing facsimile received data and a client machine.
In addition, in the conventional system using the above-described FAX server and WWW server, since image data is transferred three time through a network, i.e., from the internet FAX to the e-mail server, further from the e-mall server to the WWW server, and furthermore from the WWW server to the client machine until the client machine receives facsimile received data, and image data attached to e-mail has a data capacity approximately 1.3 times that of binary data, there is a problem that the network traffic is further increased.
Further, there is another problem that the system requires cost for a workstation as a WWW server and a dedicated application which is needed to open received data as a homepage.